


Past the Gates

by Tabithian



Series: Light the Path [2]
Category: Batman (Comics), DCU, DCU (Comics), Red Robin (Comics)
Genre: Crack, Family, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-23
Updated: 2015-08-05
Packaged: 2018-04-10 21:11:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,968
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4407836
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tabithian/pseuds/Tabithian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>If in doubt, blame Dick.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For astroneko who wanted angry Tim and scared Bat family, so. Yes. :D?

“Jesus Christ, Dick, the hell did you do?”

If in doubt, blame Dick.

Dick turns a wide-eyed look on Jason, flails his hands and yells, “I don't know!”

Because Tim.

Tim is _hunting_ them, like the goddamn Terminator, relentless and unstoppable.

He's already taken Bruce out – had gone for him first. Just walked right up to him, tipped his face up because for all that he's terrifying in his own right, Tim's so damn short compared to the rest of them.

Bruce had looked down at him, his weird kind of concern showing because _Tim_ , and then the little shit had just. 

Taken him out, fast, merciless, no change in his expression.

The rest of them had stared, stunned, and then Tim had gone after Steph, who managed to get a hit in, but again, Tim was like the fucking Terminator. Staggered a little and kept right on trucking, and the rest of them scattered, planned to regroup here, one of Jason's safe houses. 

So far the only one who's made it are Jason and Dick.

And Dick isn't looking that great, to be honest. 

(Another thing, if Jason's going to be honest about, is that if he'd thought any one of them was going to snap, he'd have put good money on himself, not to brag or anything.)

“Oh,” Dick says, crouching down, hands tangled in his hair. “Oh. No, no, no.”

That. 

That does not sound good.

“Tim's Hit List,” Dick murmurs, sounding quietly horrified.

That _really_ doesn't sound good.

“He. He had this list, of targ – people - “

“That he was going to kill?” Jason finishes, because Dick is having some kind of breakdown, and really, that's what people do when they have a goddamn hit list. Thinks about it. “Doesn't sound like him.”

Dick looks at him.

“Okay, no, you're right, it does.”

Maybe not the killing part, but the little shit does love his lists.

“And no,” Dick says, annoyed. “He wasn't going to _kill_ them.”

Only Dick doesn't look so sure of that at the moment, and, Jason's a little impressed. He never thought the kid had it in him.

“...Damian was on the list,” Dick mumbles, staring at the filthy floor. 

The fact that neither of them know where Damian is, is now a bit more troubling, what with Tim having snapped and all.

“You think it's some kind of mind control?” Dick asks, looking up at him. 

Jason considered it, on the way here, but.

“No,” he says.

In the Batcave, that had been all Tim.

It had been Tim chasing him when he hit Gotham's rooftops, not missing a beat, a trick, until Jason managed to lose him, and he's still not convinced he _did_.

That the little shit let him think he got away, has some secret plan Jason can't guess at, and -

“Come on, up, we can't stay here.”

They've been idle too long as it is, Dick having his breakdown or what the hell ever and Jason trying to figure out what the hell is going on, because this.

Bruce didn't train them for this.

Okay, no, that's a lie. He did.

Made them plan for things like this, made them learn weaknesses that could be taken advantage or when it came to other superheros if the need to take them down ever rose up. (To take one of their own down, if it came to that, and Jason knows that one a little too well.) 

Tim, though.

Such a weird kid.

********

Jason's been thinking, ever since Dick's little revelation about Tim's goddamn Hit List.

Because he knows Tim, a little, now, and.

“Are you sure he got rid of it?”

That brings Dick up short.

“What?”

Jason doesn't roll his eyes, but it's close.

“Tim's goddamn list,” Jason says. “I mean, it's Tim, right?”

Tim with that freaky brain of his that works on some twisted sort of logic. Tim, the kid who's one of the most beautiful liars Jason's ever known, who lies to _Bruce_ and gets away with it.

And from what Dick's said, the list he found out about was from a while ago. Tim's had time to update it since then, re-prioritize.

Dick doesn't answer.

********

They can't get into contact with Cass, but she should be safe in Hong Kong.

For now, at least, since even Tim can't be in two places at once.

The thing that's really got them worried is the fact they can't get in touch with Barbara, and that.

That really shouldn't be possible. 

“Holy shit, he doesn't mess around, does he?” Jason asks.

Dick glares at him.

“It's _Tim_ ,” Dick says, like that's the only thing that needs to be said, and okay, fair enough.

********

“This is, without a doubt, the worst idea you've ever had,” Jason says, following Dick through air ducts and hidden passages. “I mean, fucking seriously.”

“I didn't see you coming up with anything!” Dick snaps, one of his feet 'slipping' and nearly kicking Jason in the teeth. “Shut up, we're almost there.”

Worst, absolute worst idea ever.

********

Tim's waiting for them.

********  
Dick goes down when Jason triggers a booby trap. Trips Jason up and takes the hit instead and Jason.

“Goddamn, you're so stupid,” Jason says, staring down at him.

Looks up to where the Batcomputer is playing camera feeds from all over Gotham.

Steps over Dick and walks towards it, towards the chair in front of it.

(Bruce and Steph's bodies are nowhere to be seen.)

He stops right behind the chair, hesitates for a moment, and then, because this needs to stop, reaches out to turn it around.

Tim looks up at him, that same blank expression on his face he'd had when he took Bruce out. 

“I've been expecting you,” Tim says, like a goddamn movie villain. 

To round out the whole surreal situation, Damian's stupid cat is on his lap, studying him like he's some kind of tasty looking treat. 

And Jason, okay.

It's been a long fucking night and he is just so goddamn done.

“The hell do you want?”

Finally a flicker in Tim's expression, too fast for Jason to get a read on, but it's something.

Tim turns the chair so he's facing the Batcomputer.

“Tim?”

Tim reaches out a hand – and Jason doesn't flinch okay, he doesn't – and keys something on the Batcomputer.

One of the screen fuzzes out for a moment, before - 

“Oh my God,” Jason says, when a new image comes up.

“Yes.”

It's.

“Are you fucking kidding me?” Jason demands. “This was all - “

“It was autographed,” Tim says, so damn quiet. “Autographed, Jason. Do you know what that means?”

It means Tim's a goddamn nutcase, that's what it means.

“I fucking hate you,” Jason says, resigned.

Tim blinks, look up at the monitor that's showing footage from inside Tim's apartment (the hell, Bruce?) and Dick and Jason from a month ago, give or take. 

There had been some kind of argument, or maybe Jason just wasn't in the mood for Dick's shit, he can't remember anymore. They'd gotten into a fight. Tim's stupid framed picture of the _Wendy the Werewolf Stalker_ cast had gotten a little broken. (Okay, _ruined_.)

This family, though. What the hell.

“What is it people say?” Tim asks, and Jason looks down to see Tim holding a strange looking gun, bulky, a little point of red in the center of Jason's chest from the laser sight, like Tim needs it this close. “Oh, yes, payback's a bitch.”

And then the little shit fires.

********

“The hell is wrong with you?” Jason asks, glaring at the back of Bruce's head.

And because it's Bruce, he doesn't answer. Just continues watching the footage of that time Tim snapped and hunted them all down, one by one.

Tim's leaning against the console making notes on his tablet and muttering to himself about how to kill them all _more efficiently_ next time, and Jason.

“God, you're both such assholes.”

Tim looks up at that, _smirks_.

“We thought you were all getting a little, hmm,” Tim glances at Bruce. “Complacent?”

Bruce grunts, then says, “Sloppy.”

Jason drops his face in his hands.

“So you decided to have that asshole take us all out?”

And Bruce.

“You were supposed to stop him.”

Right, like that would have happened with Tim pissed at them for destroying nerd memorabilia.

Bruce and his goddamn training exercises. Of course he'd take advantage of the situation, agree to Tim's plan for a training scenario. (Of course Tim would bank on Bruce's love of fucking with all of them like this to get a little revenge on them, of course he would.)

********

Dick and Barbara manage to get Tim a new framed autographed cast photo and Jason's there when Dick presents it to Tim in the Batcave a few weeks later.

The kid's got this look on his face that kind of hurts to see, hands so careful with the stupid thing, and Jason.

Okay, they deserved having the little shit terrify them the way he had for that, but.

“How the hell do we know he's not going to take over the world?”

Because really.

If the kid managed to take them all out with modified paintball guns and a need for vengeance, there's no telling what he could do with the right equipment, motivation.

And Bruce.

Bruce is at the Batcomputer working on something and doesn't bother to turn around when he asks, “How do you know he hasn't already?” 

_Fuck._


	2. Epilogue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Tim supposes he had this coming.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ravenhoodoo asked for Cass and Tim hanging out, so. :D?

Tim supposes he had this coming.

********

Tim's mind is on other matters, things to do with the Titans, Wayne Enterprises, who found his emergency junk food stash, so he doesn't realize he's not alone at first.

There's no noise to give the intruder away – of course there isn't – sensation of displaced air, movement in the shadows and he doesn't turn to face it in time. (Of course he doesn't.)

Tries to twist, duck away, but he's still too slow, hands flashing out and he's being flipped, knee in his back, arm like a steel band around his throat, all done in perfect silence.

Tim's hands come up on reflex, pulling uselessly at the arm cutting off his air, raises one and slaps at the ground, once, twice.

“I give, I give,” he says, and when the arm tightens, “Urk, Cass, I can't _breathe_.”

There's a quiet laugh by his ear, and then Cass is letting him go, backing up a little to give him room to sit up.

“I didn't know you were in town.”

“Stephanie called,” she says, gives him a _look_. 

Tim rubs his throat, grateful he's still wearing his suit, because _Cass_.

“Ah.”

Cass flashes a smile at him, pats his head and wanders towards the living room, cape flowing behind her.

********

Tim had planned that little...training scenario for the others very carefully, waiting until Cass was in Hong Kong because, well.

Bruce was in on it, was a key player, but Cass - 

She would have gone along with it, if Tim had told her, but she would have made him work for it. (Actually, no, she probably would have put Tim down fast and hard and taken his place in the training scenario, bloody coup.)

“Look,” Tim says, carefully. “I'm sorry I didn't involve you in the training scenario.”

Cass looks up from his movie collection.

“We could come up with a new one?”

Tiny smile.

So yes on that one, which is good. 

Cass holds up the first season of _Wendy the Werewolf Stalker_ , head tilted slightly.

Tim has things he needs to do, plans to make, the usual, but.

“You know,” Tim says, pulling his cowl down, smile pulling at his mouth. “I have a popcorn machine.” 

Cass laughs, and yes, this. 

This is pretty important too, maybe more so.


End file.
